¡Viva la mujer!

When I was growing up, I lived next to the Rosales family for 20 years. Mr. Rosales was a police officer who used to capture or kill our cats and bully my mom over everything while wearing his police uniform. Mrs. Rosales used to lecture my mom over the back fence over the perils of letting me wear pants as a young lady. Their daughter Jenny used to damn my soul to eternal damnation for being a pagan Catholic who worshipped false idols. Our family really couldn’t stand the Rosales family, but my brother and I were forced to play nice with their children.

For years I listened to my mom rant and rave about how much she despised everything Rosales. I hate their boat because it blocks my view of the mountain. Mike Rosales is a nerd because he mows the lawn in polyester pants. Cristina Rosales is such a bitch because she looks in my kitchen window and criticized me for being a single mother. Jenny Rosales is nosey and is always peeking over the fence in the backyard. My mom abhorred everything about the Rosales family. Over the years they grew to irritate me, too.

One day Mr. Rosales began to bully my mom because as she was watering her roses, she accidentally sprayed the side of his boat. He ranted and raved about how she didn’t respect his belongings, loud enough for other neighbors to come out. Mrs. Rosales came out and joined the ranting. The next day, Mr. Rosales came over to our house in his police uniform and said that he was going to file a vandalism charge on my mom for wetting his boat. That was the day that I declared war on the Rosales family in my head.

A couple of weeks later, my mother was unfortunately in a serious car accident that landed her in the hospital for months. My father, unbeknownst to the drama between my mom and the Rosales family, asked Mrs. Rosales to babysit for me for a few weeks until my mom was discharged from the hospital. Mrs. Rosales happily obliged probably just so that she had plenty of time to talk about how my mom was in the hospital precisely because God was punishing her for being a Catholic. Every day I plotted and planned about how I could get back at her for being so mean.

One day Jenny and I went into the backyard to get ready to go swimming. As I jumped into the pool, I saw Mrs. Rosales place a few large glasses of lemonade on the table for herself as well as the children. It was then that my mind began to plot and plan until I finally decided that one way or another I was going to pee in Mrs. Rosales’ yellow lemonade. A filthy drink for a filthy mouth, I rationalized.

As soon as I saw that she went into the house, I grabbed her drink and ran into the poolroom bathroom. I squatted and peed quickly. Suddenly I looked up to see Jenny staring intently at me. “What are you doing? Why are you peeing in my mom’s lemonade?” she asked. I stared at her in horror. “Are you mad at my mom for some reason?”

“Yes, your mom said God is punishing my mom for being a Catholic. My mom said she doesn’t like her because she isn’t married. I’m wanted to wash her mouth out,” I answered. I was scared to death.

Jenny said, “I’m mad at my mom, too. She won’t let me play tetherball all week. Can you give me that glass ?” And then she squatted and splashed a little pee in it. “We need to add a little lemonade so that she doesn’t smell it,” she said, and took the glass outside and into the kitchen.

Jenny went into the kitchen and came back with the glass in her hand. “Mom, I put some ice cubes in your lemonade to make it extra cold,” she explained. And she looked at me out of the corner of her eye as she placed the lemonade on the table.

Jenny and I sat in the hot summer sun for what appeared like hours before her mom picked up that glass to take a sip. We smiled slyly at one another as the glass touched her lips. All day long we watched Mrs. Rossi nurse that drink and with each sip I waited for thunder and lighting to descend from the sky, but damnation never came.

That was the summer that I stopped hating Jenny Rosales so much and when we became pee lemonade sisters for life. In fact, we perfected the art of pee lemonade and gave it to all of the other neighborhood kids that we despised for years until we tried to unsuccessfully perfect the art of shit candy bars . Ah, childhood.

In February I had quite the adventure of trekking to Plan de Ayutla, a little known Mayan site that is completely off the beaten path in Chiapas, Mexico. After inquiring for hours with numerous people, no one even knew about the ruins. In fact, they all kept correcting me as if I were making a mistake and talking about something to do with the Mexican revolution. Eventually after a lot of searching, I was finally able to find a guide who knew how to get there.

I’m not really the kind of traveler who goes on excursions with guides. I love the thrill of finding out how to get around by myself on public transportation because I believe that nothing shows you more authenticity than how people are going about their daily lives on buses and other forms of transportation. But after asking around enough as to how to get towards the general vicinity of the ruins, I figured out that perhaps contracting a guide would be a logical choice because of the remote location and the private indigenous lands upon which the archeological site is located. I never really feel “unsafe” as a solo female traveler, but something about this remote location made me think that it would be best to take a male guide with me.

We left at 6:00 a.m. from Palenque, Chiapas on a long windy road that veers off toward the Mexican-Guatemala border. Eventually the road veered off and become a dirt road that passed through somewhat deforested rainforest and indigenous pueblitos. After endless kilometers and hours of driving through remote land, we finally reached a larger town named Nueva Palestina, or New Palestine, a town that I was surprised wasn’t so small and remote after all.

Eventually we came to a fork in the dirt road and a handful of young indigenous men arrived on bicycles and told us that we couldn’t go any farther without permission. Since the ruins are technically located on private indigenous land, the custom is that vistors must check in with the town leaders and acquire permission before approaching the ruins. We headed into the town and went from house to house, looking for the caretaker of the ruins. Apparently they change often because every time that we approached a house, the person informed us that they were no longer in charge. Eventually we found out the caretaker was at church and other leaders in the community let us pass on to the ruins after we paid a fee to enter the area.

After receiving permission to enter, we traveled for another twenty minutes on a bumpy road made out of dirt until we reached a windy set of stairs that ascended a hill. The stairs were makeshift and somewhat steep to climb. Although I’d consider myself to be in pretty good shape, it was tough to climb them and we had to stop a few times along the way.

When we reached the top, a unique building with somewhat of a rounded dome roof stood at the top of the hill. I have visited a lot of ruins before, but I have never seen a building in this shape before. Although the ruins of Plan de Ayutla are small, to see this unique building in person made the long trip worth the time and effort.

All of the ruins are located at the top of the small hill and are not very well restored-which made it all the more authentic to me. The site contains a few other buildings and some smaller stairs and platforms. I took a picture of my guide, Javier, at the top of the hill.

After we descended the hill, we walked along the muddy road through a tropical rainforest that was being deforested and used to grow coffee and graze cattle. We peeked through the foliage and saw some other ruins poking out over the top of the foliage. The guide informed me that he thought the ruins were from a pre-Columbian ball court, but I also recently read that archeologists have unearthed an old theater, so I am not really sure what those ruins were. It’s exciting to think that there might be tons of ruins and treasures beneath that vegetation!

Altogether, we were only there for about 45 minutes since the ruins are so small, but the adventure was worth it! On our way out of the town, I noticed three mountain looking formations in the distance, and I asked myself if they might be some additional ruins off in the jungle. My guide stated that he agreed that they looked like they were spaced apart from one another, just as many temples and pyramids are spaced, but that locals claim that they are natural small mountains. However, no one has confirmed what they are because they are too deep in the forest. Since I think that I am an amateur archeologist, I like to think that I just discovered some unknown Mayan ruins!

If you are interested in heading off the beaten path and visiting the ruins of Plan de Ayutla in Chiapas, Mexico, you will need to head from Palenque to the town of Nueva Palestina. There are a few local combis (mini vans) that head there in the morning, but the combis don’t return until the next day, so unless you want to stay the night there it’s probably advisable to get a guide. The ruins are approximately two to three hours from the town of Palenque. Once you get to Nueva Palestina, head straight on the dirt road to the town of Plan de Ayutla and ask anyone on the street for the caretaker of the ruins, although someone will probably approach you first. The community seems a little distrustful of strangers, so if you do want to get a guide, then contact me and I will put you in contact with my guide, Javier, who has been out there and made contact with the community a few times. The community will charge you to get in, and I paid 45 pesos, but prices can depend according to the caretaker.

Back in October, we spoke out against hate speech and joined a petition to take Jon and Ken of KFI AM640 radio off the air. Advocacy organizations began to work tirelessly to convince advertisers to pull their ads from the Jon and Ken show. Jon and Ken have been spewing their vitriol for years across […]

Sometimes it’s tough being an ambitious or financially successful woman. It’s even more difficult when you have grown up in poverty, and have therefore had less opportunity and exposure on how to work systems to your advantage. And then add on the additional difficulty of being a woman of color who has to battle discrimination […]

What does it mean to be Latino? What does the term mean? What are the implications of this label? Many have brought up that it is an imposed term and we should reject it, while others have cited the historical ‘Latinos’ and ‘Latins’, noting that people from Latin America are not accurately Latinos. All of […]

Disclaimer: This review contains a spoiler of a key event that happened to the female protagonist in the movie The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. It does not, however, contain information about the overall plot or outcome of the movie. All week long I have had an endless debate with friends over our views about […]

‘Tis the season—but for what, exactly? Last week, I decked my wall—on Facebook, that is—with some yuletide-inspired food for thought about the real meaning of Christmas and, in only a few hours’ time, had racked up nearly 100 responses from people of varying faiths, all vehemently defending their visions of Christmas against mine. I started […]

The new Michael Buble Christmas soundtrack has been released! Yes, it’s shockingly early, but who cares? Deck the halls, folks, because the best holiday is coming in hot! As silly as it sounds, people are starting to think about doing some premature Christmas shopping. Early birds avoid chaos at malls during late November and December. […]

It is after midnight and I’m in a taxi on the way back to my barrio, mouthing the lyrics to a song on the radio that I’m proud to know the lyrics of when, suddenly, I stop (fake) singing. Spanish is my second language and memorizing song lyrics doesn’t come as easily to me as […]

Yo Soy…

I am the woman of myth and bullshit.
(True. I authored some of it.)
I built my little house of ill repute.
Brick by brick. Labored,
loved and masoned it.
Sandra Cisneros, "Loose Woman"

"What you perceive as "liberal" is my independence to choose what I do, with whom, and when. Moreover, it also means that I may choose not to do it, with anyone, ever." -Ana Castillo

Disclaimer

From time to time this blog may generate compensation through free products, sponsorship, advertising/ads, and links. Any form of compensation will in no way influence the reviewer's opinion or content of the blog post. We are committed to providing honest and open opinion and commentary. We reserve the right to decline offers of advertising and sponsorships if it is not consistent with the goals and philosophy of this blog and its readers. For inquiries about advertising or product reviews, please send an email to mslatinafatale(at)yahoo(dot)com.